Tsui Hark’s animated Chinese Ghost Story is enjoyable, though in a definite HK vein. As uneven as the series that inspired it, this retelling jettisons the original plot for something more wistful and romantic. Tax collector Ning (voiced by Jan Lam) wanders the land with his pet doggie Solid Gold (voice of Tsui Hark!), lamenting over his lost love Siu Lan (Vivian Lai). Along the way, he runs into such interesting characters as ghostbuster Red Beard (James Wong Jim) and his two rivals, White Cloud (Raymond Wong) and Ten Miles (Eric Kot). 

Ning ends up being targeted for consumption by the villanous Madame Trunk (Kelly Chan), who enlists Siu Sin (called Shine in the subtitles and given effective voice by Anita Yuen) to bring her Ning’s soul. As fate would have it, Ning ends up charming Siu Sin through his naive (but misplaced) faith in her goodness. Madame Trunk is no longer the primary bad guy in this story - instead it’s everyone and everything that stands in the way of Ning and Siu Sin’s burgeoning romance. This includes all the ghostbusters, fellow ghost Butterfly (Charlie Young), and popstar/ex-boyfriend Mountain Evil (Jordan Chan). 

As frenetic as any Tsui Hark production, HK’s first animated film also proves to be incredibly charming and entertaining. The animation is great, though the disparity between the computer and cel animation is glaring. Sometimes the two elements don’t mix, but it’s still visually exciting. This film isn’t Hayao Miyazaki, but I’ll take it. (Kozo 1997)

image courtesy of Carnival Home Entertainment, Ltd.